Photo Gallery

View our photo gallery. It holds over 3,400 photos, maps and plans that have been grouped by source into more than 300 albums.

The
gallery is maintained on Picasa, which currently only allows album searching
using the 10 most used tags. To view photos from a particular building,
therefore, we would advise using Fotofeed on the appropriate page of this site.

Unique Visitors

Android App

Try our mobile Android app. The app covers general details of the eruption and provides a detailed description of all properties to be seen in Herculaneum, Stabiae, Boscoreale and Oplontis.

Utilities

Vesuvius Watch

House of the Dioscuri

Description of the House (Reg VI, Ins 9, 6)

The House of the Dioscuri, situated on the Via di Mercurio, was first
excavated between 1826 and1828 and again in 1937. It was named after the
frescoes in the fauces featuring the Dioscuri, the twin sons of Zeus,
Castor and Polydeuces (Pollux). The house is also sometimes referred to
simply as the House of Castor and Pollux...

..

.The central part of the house
has a standard
atrium/garden layout with rooms arranged around all four sides of the
atrium. The atrium
has lost much of its fourth
style decoration due to damage from the eruption, weathering of the
exposed walls and the ad-hoc removal of the most notable frescoes. Some
of these frescoes can now be seen in the National Archaeological Museum
in Naples; they include images of Bacchus, Ceres, Saturn and Jupiter and
a scene with Pan and Hermaphrodite, pictured right, which was
originally in the ala
(c) on the south side of the atrium.
..The tablinum
(d) lies on the east side of the atrium
facing the entrance (pictured lower right). It is decorated in the fourth
style, but, like the atrium,
the walls have lost much of their colour and vibrancy and has been stripped
of their best frescoes. ..

..On the west side the tablinum is open to the atrium over its full width while on the east side there is a wide doorway which opens onto the peristyle
(i). The peristyle is colonnaded on two sides, the columns being coated with stucco and painted red and white. In the centre of the peristyle is a small garden which has a temple style lararium
(pictured below) on its rear wall.,,

..The tricliniumhas a plain white mosaic floor with a single
black border. In the centre of the east wall is a window which overlooks
the peristyle
to the east. ..
The atrium
has cubicula
on its north, west and south sides. The three cubicula
on the north side are in a poor state of repair but do retain some of their fourth
style decoration. The eastmost cubiculum also has a fine white mosaic floor with a broad multi-coloured rectangular border framing a central white panel...
The largest of the cubicula
(f) is probably in the worst condition of the three but was also the
most finely decorated. The faded washed out decoration consisted of
white and blue panels above a lower red frieze with mythological scenes
on three walls. The mythological scene on the west wall has all but
vanished and was perhaps of Narcissus while that on the south wall has been lost along with much of the wall. The surviving fresco of
Selene descending towards Endymion (pictured opposite) was removed from the north wall during the early excavations and is
now in the Naples National Museum...

.
The
cubiculum
(g) (pictured above and right) has survived in much better condition.
It is decorated in the fourth
style on a white ground with white framed panels over a lower red
frieze all below an upper zone of figures surrounded by architectural
elements.

On the south side of the fauces, room (h) is a
service room with stairs to the upper floor. The remainder of the
service areas including the kitchen (j) can be found to the north of
peristyle (i).

There is a second fight of stairs off the atrium
in the north east corner next to the andron which leads from the atrium
to the peristyle.
An oecus
(k) is also accessed off this passage. The oecus is decorated in the fourth
style with white panels and architectural elements on a white ground over
a lower red frieze (pictured right). The central panel on the west wall
has a fresco of Apollo and Daphne while that on the south wall contains a scene with Silenus and Bacchus. On the east wall is a window overlooking the peristyle (i)...

.. The columns of the portico are stuccoed with fluted tops over circular bases. The ambulatory
of the peristyle
has black and white mosaic paving which is particularly fine at the
east end where it consists of a crisp geometric design...
Many of the finer frescoes
found in the peristyle
have been removed but the
painting of a maenad (pictured below) remains in situ on the north
wall (right). ..

...Two of the frescoes which were removed from the peristyle can be viewed in the National Archaeological Museum in Naples. The first of these is ofMedea
and her Children (pictured right) which portrays Medea as she
contemplates killing her children as the best way to hurt her husband Jason. ..

..

The second fresco illustrates Perseus rescuing Andromeda (pictured above) in which Perseus is
depicted freeing Andromeda after killing the sea monster Cetus. Both these frescoes were found on the broad pilasters
at the eastern end of the peristyle...In the centre of theperistyle
is a garden which contains two basins, one of which is particularly large (pictured right) while the
second, at the western end of the garden, is of more modest proportions...
Off
the eastern side of the peristyle is an exedra (l), by far the
largest room in the house. Once veneered with marble, the walls are now bare. Off a passageway behind this room is a posticum (n) which opened onto the Vicolo del Fauno.

..The
fauces
(a), which opens off the east side of the Via di Mercurio, is decorated in the fourth
style on a red ground with individual frescoes of the twins, Castor
and Pollux, placed either side of the vestibule (one is pictured lower left). The
fauces
opens onto a grand atrium
(b) (pictured below) which is unusual, being only one
of four in Pompeii
with Corinthian
columns supporting the roof. The twelve fluted columns, ranged round the central impluvium, were stuccoed and painted in the traditional red and white. ..

..

..

..
These included the painting of Achilles at
Skyros (pictured left) taken from the central panel of the south wall and the small painting of Oedipus and the Sphynx
(pictured below) from the upper zone on the same wall. Both these frescoes can be seen in the National Archaeological Museum
in Naples...

..The triclinium
(e) off the south east corner of the atrium is decorated in the fourth
style with red and blue panels separated by fantastic architectural elements
above a lower blue decorative frieze (shown below).
The central panels of each wall held a large mythological scene. The
two surviving scenes, on the north and west walls, remain in-situ but
are in a rather poor condition with damaged plasterwork and considerable
loss of detail. The scene on the north wall is of Nymphs taking the newborn Adonis while that on the west wall is of Minos and Scylla.

..

..

lOn the
south side of the atrium
a wide portal leads off the ala
(c) to a second peristyle
(m), pictured left and below. This peristyle
is richly decorated in the fourth
style with yellow panels bordered with red and separated by
imaginary architectural elements and still lifes above a lower
decorative frieze...